Friday, July 17, 2009

Apple Can't hear me here in Jamaica (semi-rant)

So I'm hunting for a laptop, I came across the Windows Laptop hunter ads



and started thinking hmmm.... maybe I should just buy a PC. After returning to reality I started to think about my next few months of scheming to get an affordable Mac. Unfortunately, even though I'm associated with an educational institution, Apple doesn't care. When they say that they offer EDU discounts it seems only to be for US institutions.

Hey Apple, my institution has 4 Mac labs and possibly 12 labs with PCs (probably more, just being conservative with my estimates), Guess why? Dell is almost predatory with their discounts and they actually acknowledge educational institutions outside of the (gasp) USA.

So Apple, I'm going to test my theory and find out if you're "agile" enough to respond to my request. Here is what I'm hoping will happen in the next month and a half.

1. Treat the Jamaican Mac solution providers like first rate solution providers, give them the deep discounts you give to their US counterparts. This will benefit me because then they'll actually be able to compete in this market and I'll have a chance of walking into an Apple store [in my own country] and getting a Mac for a more reasonable price.
2. Actually facilitate educational discounts in my country. This will be easier if you're working along side the existing Mac guys here in Jamaica. You can start with offering discounts to the University of the West Indies, Mona.

If you actually pull this off I predict the following:
1. The number of Mac labs on my campus will double.
2. The number of students using Mac laptops will double.

I know that's probably a drop in the bucket, after all Jamaica only has a population of 2-point-something million. The University is one of a handful of universities here, the population is about 11,000, not much I guess but since academic institutions tend to have a higher uptake of Macs, you never know, 40% of Princeton faculty and students are Mac users. Imagine over 3000 Mac laptops at a Jamaican University (that's roughly 40%), It could happen.

Closing thought. It might be worth your money though as Jamaica tends to have an impact on the globe which is disproportionate to its size, think Reggae Music, Bob Marley, Cool Runnings, Jamaican Sprinters, Jerk Seasoning.

If I do get a PC, I'll be running this on it anyway.

Oh and Apple, regarding those laptop hunter people, find them 6 months from now and find out how they feel about the purchase.

1 comment:

Electric City said...

DOWN WITH APPLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! RAWRRRR

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